Ethical Care to Patients with Decreased Levels of Consciousness and its Relationship with Demographic Characteristics of Nurses in Intensive Care Units

The basis of the nursing profession is the observance of ethics in providing care. Therefore, this study aims to investigate providing ethical care to patients with decreased Levels of Consciousness (LOC) and its relationship with the demographic characteristics of nurses in Intensive Care Units (ICUs).

This cross-sectional study was conducted in 2019. The samples included 70 nurses working in ICUs, who met the inclusion criteria for the study and were selected by simple random sampling. The data collection tool was a two-part researcher-made questionnaire including demographic characteristics ( 6 questions) and 38 questions related to ethical care of patients with decreased LOC in two areas of nurse and professional commitment (20 questions), nurse and clinical services (18 questions). Reliability was obtained by internal consistency and Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was obtained to be 0.869. The questionnaire was completed by self-reporting.

The results of the study showed that the total score of ethical care is from 108 to 151 with a mean and standard deviation (125/7± 09/ 67) from 152. This means that all nurses had a relatively high score of ethical care. Statistical tests also showed that there was no significant relationship between demographic variables of samples such as age, level of education, marital status and employment status with the total score of ethical care in ICUs ((P> 0.05).

According to the findings it can be stated that there is no statistically significant relationship between nurses 'demographic characteristics and patients' ethical care with decreased LOC. It can be concluded that nurses, especially nurses of ICUs who care for patients with reduced LOC, regardless of their different types of demographic variables, feel ethically responsible for providing care to their patients and try to provide care services with the highest ethical standards.